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[Guide] Pantheon - Insert "300" Quote Here.

1. Introduction
Pantheon is a damage dealer, he fills the role of a carry and ganker on your team. Pantheon is NOT an auto-attack hero, he relies mostly on his abilities for damage. I've decided to write this guide because I see too many people build Pantheon with bad setups. Getting attack speed first for Pantheon is NOT a good way to build him. Why only improve your auto-attack when you can improve both your auto-attack and abilities with attack damage? Attack speed is also meaningless without attack damage. Attack speed is only good for tanking towers with Pantheon, because it procs his passive. I will try to make this guide brief and to the point, I know how frustrating it is to read long guides that go off on tangents and become difficult to find the information you want.

2. Abilities (Commentary)
[Passive] Aegis Protection - After attacking or casting spells 4 times, block the next normal attack that deals more than 40 damage. This essentially just blocks auto-attacks, including Towers and Parrrley.

[W] Aegis of Zeonia - Leaps to an enemy champion and stuns them. Also refreshes Aegis Protection. Deals 50/75/100/125/150 damage with 20/17.5/15/12.5/10 sec cooldown. Stuns for 1 second at all levels and costs 70 mana at all levels. Cannot target allies or creeps.

Active: Channeled ability that deals damage to all enemies in front of you. Hits 5 times, with each strike dealing 6/9/12/15/18 + 18/21/24/27/30% of your weapon damage. Costs 70/80/90/100/110 mana with a 30/28/26/24/22 sec cooldown. Takes 1 second to channel all 5 hits. Deals DOUBLE damage to enemy champions. In other words, it deals 180 + 300% of your weapon damage to enemy champions if you hit them all 5 times.

[R] Grand Skyfall - Teleports to any location, dealing 400/700/1000 damage in a huge area when you land, and slows enemies by 35% for 1 sec. Damage is 100% at the center, and down to 33% at the edges. Cooldown is 180/150/120 sec and costs 150/250/350 mana. Takes 3 seconds to cast, and 2.5 seconds to land. Can use summoner abilities when the landing circle appears.

3. Summoner Spells[Flash + Exhaust]

These spells are great for Pantheon because they synergize very well with Grand Skyfall. Summoner spells can be used when the ring comes up, which allow you to reposition yourself and keep the enemy within the centerpoint. They can also be used both defensively and offensively. Pantheon has no slow aside from his ult, so Exhaust is really helpful to prevent enemies from escaping.

Runner Up: Ignite - Good for first blood/early game, but loses its effectiveness later on

Don't get: Revive, Smite, Teleport, Clarity, Fortify
Revive is for Nubs, Smite is for Junglers, Grand Skyfall = Teleport, You should have no mana problems, Fortify is good for someone else on your team but not you.

4. Masteries[21/9/0] or 21/0/9

Standard offense build with 4/4 Sorcery and 3/4 Alacrity. Spec 9 defense for nimbleness if you use dodge runes.

As always, armor penetration is better if stacked because the armor formula is not linear; more armor penetration = greater gain with each additional rune. For quintessences I use Flat HP because I think that the benefit early game is huge. But if you want a more offensive build, armor penetration is the way to go. Move speed quintessences could also work with a utility build. Pantheon has the highest move speed in the game, tied with Master Yi.

You want to max Spear Shot first because it is your main ability at the beginning and a great harassing tool. It has low mana cost and short cooldown, so you can spam it. Heartseeker strike can wait a little bit because it isn't that great until you get some attack damage items, then it becomes devastating. It has a long cooldown and high mana cost, so you won't be using it that much early on. Aegis is maxed last because it stuns for 1 second at all levels. The damage increase per level is negligible (only +25). You would only want to level it because the cooldown gets decreased. The increase in damage from heartseeker/spear shot is too significant to justify maxing this skill before the other 2. Typically you will only need to use Aegis once to kill your enemy. If they live beyond your initial Aegis + Heartseeker combo, you can just spam them with spear shot until they die.

Start:[Doran's Shield + HP Pot] - I've found this to be the most versatile way to start, giving me a solid 700+ HP at level 1 with HP runes. The regen is necessary against most good players who will harass you when you get close to the creeps. You should really only go in to last hit creeps anyway.

OR Long Sword + HP Pot - If you want to be more deadly at the beginning, this isn't a bad build. Turn it into a Sword of the Occult or Brutalizer. I'm not really a fan of getting long sword first though, I think that getting the B.F. sword as soon as possible is better.

First trip back, buy with priority:*** B.F. Sword
** Boots of Speed
* Brutalizer or Sword of the Occult (ONLY if you bought Long Sword first)

Sword of the Occult
With the recent change to this item, it's pretty good for Pantheon now. At 20 stacks, it gives +100 damage and +15% move speed for 42% of the cost of Bloodthirster. At end game though, if you can't keep it at 20 stacks you'd be better off buying a different item.

Last Whisper
This item is pretty good against tanks who stack armor. It's preferrable over Black Cleaver because Spear Shot/Heartseeker will be affected by it.

Banshee's Veil
Always a great item to get if you need survivability. Builds up from a good early game item too. If you are going against a heavy caster team, this is a must have. If you need even more survivability, get a frozen mallet.

Trinity Force
This item is decent on Pantheon but not something I'd recommend getting. It's good simply because Phage and Zeal are both good on Pantheon, but Sheen isn't that great. You will mostly be using all your skills first, then auto-attack if the target isn't dead. So really it is only effective when you are chasing and Spear Shotting.

Early Game (Level 1-6)
Harass as much as possible with Spear Shot. It's cooldown is short and costs very little mana. Try to lane with someone with a stun, such as Blitzcrank, Ryze, or Janna. Once you hit lvl 2, you should be able to first blood with Aegis + Exhaust. Mana really shouldn't be an issue during the laning phase. You should stick to just using spear shot to harass. Only use Aegis + Heartseeker if you think you can kill the enemy. If possible, try to stay in the lane until you hit level 6. Go in for last hits, but also harass the enemy with spear shot if they get too close to your creeps. Typically if you play somewhat aggressively and constantly harass with spear shot, the enemy will back off and you can prevent them from getting creep kills. Be assertive, put your foot down, and control your lane.

Mid-Game
Now that you are level 6, you can start helping your team with ganking. When you fountain, always check your other lanes to see if people are low on health. If they are, indicate to your teammates that you are going to skyfall. Remember it takes 3 seconds to cast and 2.5 secs to land, so you need to predict where you think the enemy will be. You usually want to skyfall a little bit behind the enemy, so that they will either have to run forward towards your allies/tower or backwards into the center of your skyfall. Use flash/exhaust when the ring comes up to keep the enemy within the skyfall area. Once you land, immediately Aegis then Heartseeker Strike. Typically, you should always follow up an Aegis with Heartseeker Strike. Hopefully you should have a B.F. sword by now. Once you get that first B.F. sword your heartseeker strike should do a lot of damage. You should be able to clear a creep wave with 1 cast of heartseeker strike. Remember if you use this on enemy champions, it does double damage so it actually is a significant amount.

Group Fights
In group fights, your positioning is very important when using heartseeker strike. You have 1 chance to use heartseeker strike. Try to hit as many enemies as possible with it. It is absolutely devastating if you can hit all 5 enemies with it and can make or break the battle. You should not be the one to initiate a group fight. You need to be alive the whole time because you are your team's main source of damage. Using your ultimate correctly can be a big asset to your team's success. Similar to twisted fate, you can be anywhere on the map when your ultimate is up. You can be pushing a lane and skyfall in with your team when they are about to engage the enemy team. You can defend a tower and instantly kill all the creeps around it. You can force an enemy to back away from pushing a tower. You typically want to skyfall in as soon as your team engages the other team. Avoid doing it too early or too late, or you will be the only person there fighting their entire team. If you do find yourself casting it at a bad time, you can cancel it while it is still casting with about a ~30 sec cooldown penalty. However if the ring comes up it is too late. You want to jump in to put the enemy team in an unfavorable position, forcing them all to take 1000 AOE damage.
Backdooring
If it has to come down to this, Pantheon is a very good backdooring hero. If you plan on tanking a tower, it is preferrable to have an attack speed item, such as Phantom Dancer. Skyfall in and do not stop attacking the tower. If you picked up an attack speed item, you should be able to negate most of the tower's damage with Aegis Protection. Your attack speed can be fast enough that it will always be up when the tower takes a shot.

Thanks for reading my guide and good luck! Questions/Comments welcome.
Also have a Fiddlesticks guide: http://www.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=92303

I rarely use sword of the occult beyond shaco. You said it yourself pantheon's not an auto attack hero, so it's almost never worth getting a sword of the occult. None of his abilities crit, hell they all do magic damage; which is why I don't even bother with black cleaver.

I'd suggest building pantheon like kat, get a bunch of B.F swords before upgrading them into bloodthirsters. Boots to suit, be it mercury for MR/CC reduction or Lv 3 movement speed. Atk speed boots are for..auto attacking and you can live without the 25% atk speed bonus. @ lvl 18 that brings you to what almost 1.2 atks per second? I'd rather run faster since as you said pantheon has no means of slowing down his target. Frozen Mallet doesn't proc of abilities and most people don't build Ryjal.

In hindsight Ryjal scepter seems to be a good deal. AoE 15% slow with heartseeker, or 30% slow on a spear cuck/aegis. I just never bother to get one when I play pantheon.

this is sooo another glass cannon build -_-
by the time you spend your time trying to build infinity and bloodthirster you are one hell of a squishy champion , specially against casters u just die in one breath

this is sooo another glass cannon build -_-
by the time you spend your time trying to build infinity and bloodthirster you are one hell of a squishy champion , specially against casters u just die in one breath

Then buy Mercury's and a Banshee's. Items are always situational in this game. The "Typical Item Build" is just a quick look for people who are searching for a general idea of what kind of items to get. It isn't a "set in stone, always get this" list. A game usually never lasts that long anyway. I almost never play a game beyond getting 2 Bloodthirsters and an Infinity Edge. The only items that I actually said should be "required" was Bloodthirster and I.E. The rest are really your choice based on the situation.

Quote:

Kritara:

None of his abilities crit, hell they all do magic damage.

Spear Shot and Heartseeker Strike do physical damage. Just because it's an ability does not mean it does magic damage.

Quote:

Kritara:

I rarely use sword of the occult beyond shaco. You said it yourself pantheon's not an auto attack hero, so it's almost never worth getting a sword of the occult.

Can't tell if you're just agreeing with me or not. I said that I tried Sword of the Occult out and concluded that it's not worth the money compared to a B.F. Sword.

Not bad guide. I play Pantheon along similar lines, though I've had to moderate my approach due to the needs of the premade I usually run him in -- mixing in some attack speed makes him push/backdoor like a fiend.

Anyway, what's the rationale behind that required Infinity Edge? It's expensive and if you're stressing his abilities, critical chance doesn't do a lot for you. Personally I prefer just doubling up on Bloodthirsters; after the third minion kill, they're more efficient attack power, and two fill as fast as one does. The absurd lifesteal they give is helpful in that Pantheon is squishy even with a full health bar; anything less is just asking for it.

Anyway, what's the rationale behind that required Infinity Edge? It's expensive and if you're stressing his abilities, critical chance doesn't do a lot for you. Personally I prefer just doubling up on Bloodthirsters; after the third minion kill, they're more efficient attack power, and two fill as fast as one does. The absurd lifesteal they give is helpful in that Pantheon is squishy even with a full health bar; anything less is just asking for it.

I think you bring up a good point that it becomes equivalent to an Infinity edge in terms of gold/damage after 3 minion kills. I had never thought about that. In any case, I typically DO get 2 Bloodthirsters and an Infinity Edge, just maybe not in that order. It's usually BT/IE/BT or BT/BT/IE. I put i.E. in my "required" section because I think that you should get it at some point in the game, whether it be 2nd or 3rd damage item. if you have high damage it's necessary to have crit chance to amplify that, and it's icing on the cake to have your crits hit even harder.

The argument for saying crit chance isn't useful because you are stressing abilities also applies to lifesteal too. Both of those stats have no effect if you aren't auto-attacking. I was actually just stressing not to get attack speed. Why only improve your auto-attack when you can improve both auto-attack and abilities with attack damage? Auto-attacks are still necessary to score kills though, you usually cannot attack someone with full health and kill them with just your abilities.

So IE vs BT. What's better, even more lifesteal [15-25% lifesteal & -20 to +20 dmg] or [+20% crit +50% crit dmg -880g]? Honestly I don't think it matters. They are about equally good. Which one I pick first depends on how much gold I have at the fountain. A lot of times I'll have ~1000g and want to gank someone with skyfall, so I just buy a pickaxe. Pickaxe + B.F. sword is good to keep in your inventory anyway, and is stronger and cheaper than an unfarmed bloodthirster.

Thanks lyrondak for starting this thread and for everyone adding to it!..
been trying to work out a better way to play Pantheon as i'm still new to LOL and definately prefer to play a challenging character over my usual usage of Fiddlesticks (who is quite OP in the right hands).

The only thing that is a little unclear is the on-hit effects of weapons like cleaver/frozen mallet etc. on the different attacks from Pantheon.
Also the effect of ability power seems like it adds nothing whatsoever.

I like Pantheon quite a bit, but I find his survivability using this or any variation of this build to be extremely lacking. As said above, this character will die to the focus of any mage he hasn't just Aegis'd. Nevermind any sort of team focus.

What item should be bought for survivability and when?

What about mana regen? In order to harass effectively you need to spear shot a lot. Despite a low cooldown, and cost, it eats P's mana very quickly. How do you counteract this? Golem? Blue pilling?

I typically use Flash and Exhaust and while Pantheon is one of the fastest characters in the game, BPing to regen mana is not efficient at all.

Grand Skyfall shouldn't really be relied on to do damage. Don't build around it. It's too costly and its cooldown is too long to rely on consistently. Also, it's easy as HELL to avoid.